Whatever your product or unique selling point might be, you will start your ecommerce journey with a question that all e-retailers must answer; which platform should you host your store on?

Your chosen platform will act as the bedrock of your online offering and will form the foundations that you build you tech stack on. It will also determine the future scalability of your site and how your store will behave in the future.

When done correctly your users will be completely unaware of what’s in your tech stack, as this will make up the hidden elements of your store, they will however be able to see its effects and how successfully it works.

Shopify vs Magento

There are countless articles online which break down the key similarities and differences between each of the main players, however none of them give much insight into the realities and implications of choosing one platform over another other.

When initially deciding which platform to host on, what is it that lures someone in? And what role do these factors ultimately play when it comes to the longevity of a business and total cost of running an online store?

When Is A Fixed Cost Not A Fixed Cost?

Platforms like Magento lean more towards a larger upfront investment to build your website and lower fixed running costs, so as you grow the investment gets more cost-effective . Sounds good doesn’t it? However, our experience with an array of clients reveals that this initial cost rarely ends up being the end of the development, and their comments reveal that the final development bill can often snowball quickly into a much larger cost.

Other costs that have to be taken into account include the ongoing cost of hiring a specialist team who will be responsible for maintaining and running your website. It’s important to note that with this, you will also have to consider the total time that will be spent waiting at the hands of your developers and having to pay for features that Shopify allows at the click of a button. Do you really want to be sat waiting around for something when your Shopify competitors made this change without even blinking and have already started to profit…

But what if you already have your own hosted ecommerce store and you’re exploring your options?

As we are operating in such an incredibly fast-paced industry, adapting your store to work alongside each update will result in extra fees that fall outside of your initial proposed cost. And after already investing a large amount of money into optimising your existing store, it can become increasingly difficult to justify further development each time an update is released.

However by failing to embrace to these updates, your store will fall behind. Leaving you in the difficult position of spending money on running and maintaining a store which is no longer optimised towards an engaging customer journey or converting visitors.

Adapting To Change

Let’s take the impact of Social Media as an example. Social media has had an undeniable role in shaping our current consumer habits, in particular how we interact with ecommerce stores and brands. Being able to adopt social media into your ecommerce offering is therefore crucial for keeping consumers as engaged participants in your sales funnel.

For example, consumers are now able to shop directly via Instagram Stories, and while those with a bespoke built store (like Magento) had to work around this development in order to implement these change, whereas a hosted ecommerce solution such as Shopify, instantly provided a solution and created an update which allowed for stores in their ecosystem to adapt to this change and offered it to their customers straight away.

The above example also relates to a frequent issue that ecommerce vendors face; not being able to edit the core code of your site. Leaving you vulnerable to change as the industry develops at a pace that you are unable to keep up with, and frustrated at a site which costs a lot to maintain but simply doesn’t deliver results.

My past experience with Cloggs is a prime example of this, as I remember trying to add ‘Amazon Payments’ to our checkout and spending literally 2 years discussing the change with our platform provider, only for this process to take so long that so it never actually happened! We were stuck due to technical onboarding issues and the increasing cost that it would take to implement this change. Now seeing how Shopify allows you to add new payments to your checkout by simply checking a box in the backend and it makes me chuckle…. Etailers of today don’t know how easy they’ve got it!

Quantifying Additional Costs

In order to have a successful store, you need a site which is equipped to develop and adapt alongside changing consumer shopping habits. The brands which have continued to generate steady business and make retail work despite current trading conditions can attribute a percentage of their success to their sites ability to adapt to industry change and use social to engage their customers and being able to do so in a low risk, low cost manner.

Costs which are difficult to quantify in a simple comparison blog include the cost of your time. With Shopify, retailers are left to focus on what they specialise in; product and proposition. Their time isn’t spend chasing a team regarding an endless list of updates that need to be implemented into their store.

Another cost which is often left out of these blogs is opportunity cost. As Shopify works to create solutions as soon as a new update is released, you don’t have to spend time worrying about future proofing your store as Shopify is already doing this for you automatically and you don’t lose out waiting to justify the expenditure or for your development partner to get round to the development. The retail industry is packed with short windows of opportunity to make the sale, missing out a key piece of development pre-Black Friday for example could make or break the retail year.

The Real Price Of An Ecommerce Store

There is a real cash pressure of running an ecommerce site, and being able to keep up with changing consumer habits is vital. You want to know that the ecommerce platform you have chosen is able to deliver on your expectation of having a store that is future proofed for the success of your business.

Taking a look back at which platform historically has the best track record for keeping up with change, Shopify comes out on top. And looking to the future, Shopify again has the best reputation for being able to effectively future proof your store. The bonus of choosing a platform which is able to deliver on these expectations and accommodate industry changes is that any stress is being taken out of your hands in a cost effective way.

Shopify works on a shared success model, so as the platform improves and more stores choose to invest in it, this will be return in the development of your store in terms of keeping the platform fresh, innovative and adaptable to industry change. Most importantly, it allows retailers time to focus on what they’re good at.

If you want to say goodbye to unnecessary costs and investing in a store which is geared towards the future success of your business, take a look at our website to see how we can get you set up on Shopify and even manage your ongoing digital marketing.

Whatever you were doing, if you had internet access and a Twitter account then it’s likely you were watching the implosion of Fyre Festival unfold through a series of Twitter threads and hashtags.

There’s No Smoke Without Fyre

For those that aren’t aware of Fyre Festival, this was an event which had been marketed as a luxury music festival and originally gained viral fame after a social media campaign that starred Instagram’s most trending models.

Tickets for the doomed event sold online for thousands of dollars and were almost immediately snapped up by influencers and rich socialites alike. However, far from the luxurious escape that consumers were promised, what ensued was more akin to a millennial rendition of Lord of the Flies than a private island getaway.

It seems quite fitting that an event which promised to be ‘Instagram come to life’ was ultimately shattered by a single image of a cheese sandwich in a styrofoam container that was Tweeted by one of the guests, creating a glaring contrast between the fiction that was sold and the reality that was experienced.

We Didn’t Start The Fyre

Fyre festival has since become a cautionary tale in the world of influencer marketing and has forced the industry to place itself under an intense microscope.

Operating as a modern form of word-of-mouth advertising, there’s no reason why companies shouldn’t harness the power of influencers to help sell their products. What needs to be established however is the distribution of social responsibility that brands, social media agencies and influencers have when selling a product or lifestyle to a consumer.

Jerry Media, the agency behind the popular meme account @FuckJerry, were responsible for marketing of the festival and the orange tile campaign that initially catapulted Fyre into the public sphere. The question here is how much responsibility should we ascribe to Jerry Media for the scam that Fyre Festival turned out to be?

While they aren’t responsible for the event itself and had no authority regarding logistics or decision making, they did play a significant role in getting consumers to part with their cash and contributed to a false image of an event that turned out to be nothing more than a failed trick of smoke and mirrors.

The ethics surrounding influencer marketing is a topic that requires deeper discussion, for example, where is the line between promoting a product to an engaged audience and outright exploiting them? How much due diligence should an influencer do to ensure that the product they are promoting is what customers will receive? And what are the wider implications that come from selling a product as a result of a swipe up from someone’s story?

Ultimately, what the recent Fyre Festival documentaries expose is the hold that influencers have over their followers and how easily they can turn them into a pool of eager consumers.

Selling A Dream

What initially looks like a documentary that serves to feed our morbid curiosity surrounding a festival gone wrong actually becomes an interesting exploration on engaged audiences and how willing many of us are to buy into the narratives that we are sold on our timeline. One of the event organisers in the Netflix documentary event even says; “We’re selling a pipe dream to your average loser.”

What makes Fyre Festival so interesting for those that work in the digital marketing sphere is that an entirely social media-based marketing campaign was responsible for enticing thousands of rich millennials to part with an extortionate amount of money for what is now known to be a fraudulent scam. The organisers of Fyre Festival exploited the potential of social media to sell an experience which never actually existed.

Despite the now infamous nature of Fyre Festival, influencer marketing is still as strong as ever, with brands routinely paying big-name influencers hundreds of thousands of pounds to post product reviews on their Instagram and mention their products in YouTube hauls. One noticeable consequence that you will see when scrolling through Instagram is that the crackdown on more open transparency in regards to influencers explicitly stating whether their content is a sponsored post or not. Even an item that has been ‘gifted’ by a company must be labeled as a sponsored post.

If working with influencers is something that you want to pursue, it is essential that you work with an agency that understands the role this modern type of marketing will play in your digital strategy and who is responsible for delivering what result. Contact our team today to find out more.

Another festive season has come and gone, and the latest sales data released on ‘Retail Super Thursday’ tells us stories of a number of former high street heavyweights who are struggling and whose traditional business models are now inadvertently causing their downfall.

Winners and Losers

But how are stores, that used to be the pinnacle of British retail, now suffering their worst Christmas since the height of the financial crisis? Before the results of Retail Super Thursday had even been released, the growing disparity between traditional bricks and mortar retail and ecommerce retail had created a backdrop of tense trading conditions.

Some of the losers from the 2018 festive period included HMV, who have recently been called into administration for the second time in six years as a result of changing consumer habits and a (no longer recent!) shift to online streaming, and Debenhams, who have been struggling for some time, reported like-for-like sales falling 6.2% in the 18 weeks to January 5th.

Many retailers are referencing volatile and increasingly difficult trading conditions as the cause of these disenchanting results, with retail correspondents confirming that our high streets have been left exposed and vulnerable thanks to the spiralling cost of keeping a bricks and mortar stores open, the decline in consumer footfall during November and December and of course the increasing competition coming from online giants such as Amazon.

A Shift Towards Online Shopping

Each year Christmas shopping increasingly shifts more towards being an online event, but is it fair to ascribe the rise in ecommerce businesses as the main catalyst for this trend and the causal reason for the downfall of the great British high street? This narrative that the high street is suffering because digital has an unfair advantage and are stealing away customers is a tired one and requires unpacking. Let’s take the often cited ‘rates’ debate for example.

Ecommerce businesses and traditional bricks and mortar stores are both competing for consumer interest in a crowded marketplace, however operating a successful online store requires a completely different business model and involves a widely different distribution of running costs.

Distribution of Costs

In a recent article, Amazon confirmed their UK business rates of £63.4m, which is roughly £40m less than Next despite generating over double the number of sales compared to the UK retailer. Looking further into these figures, only £2m of Amazon’s rates bill (3%) comes from the seven Whole Foods Market stores that they own, and the business rates for their High Street Kensington flagship amount to nearly £1m. Amazon commented that: “Online sales are still less than a fifth of total retail sales in the UK”.

The additional tax burden for high street retailers plays a significant role in the growing imbalance between ecommerce and high street stores and adds additional pressure to already tense trading conditions. However, as noted above, the two operate using two completely different business models which require two completely different distributions of costs. To simply accredit the troubles facing the high street to the rise in ecommerce and its supposed advantages is both irresponsible and inaccurate and adds fuel to the notion that digital businesses should be taxed more.

The two largest costs for a high street store are likely to be their rent and their stock, both of which are governed by the private sector. Rates bills come under focus because they are legislated by the Government and are not insignificant of course, but small relief on this one cost alone will do little against poor gross margins on the long term performance of a business.

Furthermore, rates on a high street should be high as they cost more to maintain! We need to invest in and improve our city centres, a central government decision to cut costs here would only serve to put an increased strain on local government and could consequently result in our shopping districts becoming even less desirable places to go. Rates may be an easy target, but they are ultimately unlikely to reverse the current market trends.

The Price of A Ecommerce Store

So why does digital still get the blame for this cost being different when it comes to running an online store? Let’s look at this from the ‘etailers’ perspective, there are no barriers to entry when creating an online store, for example, competition is rife and can come from nowhere. In order to run a successful business and generate sales online, a large percentage of your costs need to be spent in driving traffic to your site as there will be virtually no organic footfall on day 1 without prior funding or investment in your online footprint via SEO, PPC and social media.

A retail store on the high street, on the other hand, may be paying a higher percentage of rent and rates, but they get a guaranteed or the very least a predictable level of footfall on day 1 and every day thereafter, making these figures effectively a part of their marketing cost. Comparing marketing costs, rent and rates across the industries would be a far more revealing analysis to undertake.

Etailers do benefit from a tax system geared towards encouraging research and development where there are notable reliefs available, which no doubt contributes to the low rates of tax that these digital businesses pay. We should look to similar reliefs for the high street, rewarding innovation and those businesses genuinely investing to improve the nature of their retail, rather than un-targeted and blunt measures to reduce rates.

Next Steps

When it comes down to it, an ecommerce store is the same threat to a high street store as an escalator is to a set of stairs. One is seen as more convenient than the other, but preference will always come into play and really they are both just different means to the same end – to sell a product to a consumer. The next step for stores hoping to survive the changing retail landscape rests in their ability to innovate their customer experience and integrating a seamless multi-channel approach which will make it easier for customers to shop their products.

We know, we know it’s been a couple of weeks and we haven’t given you a run through of our highly anticipated launch night for GirlCode. We apologise, actually no we don’t because Rosie, our Digital Marketing Manager in her infamous talk told us all we need to ‘Stop Saying Sorry’. If you weren’t there, then you wouldn’t get the joke, sorry (not sorry).

Rosie thought of GirlCode (then named simply, women in digital) back in the latter half of 2017. We had no branding, we had no idea of who we wanted to speak, what the topic was going to be we just knew we had to do it. Before Christmas, we tried to get the ball rolling, but being in an agency right before Christmas trying to create a revolutionary event probably wasn’t the best idea of ours.

We came back for 2018 with a new spring in our step, and more of hunger for getting the event launched. First of all we needed a launch day and what better day than International Women’s Day, a day that is for all women no matter where you are, who you are, what you do, how old you are – International Women’s Day is a day for you! By deciding the day we had also given ourselves a deadline and countless late nights at the office, pleading with people to give us freebies, securing a venue and most of all finding speakers that were both diverse and inspirational (and part of me just wanted to find speakers that I personally loved).

The lovely people at 1000 Trades offered us the room and the first time we went to visit the room we were discussing how we could use the various table sizes and chairs to fill the room, whilst making a strategic list of who out of our friends and family would actually come. A couple of weeks later we went to set the room up and found ourselves taking out furniture to make sure everyone could fit in. Our tickets on eventbrite sold out within a couple of weeks and we suddenly went from talking in front of our mums and pals (that were there for the beverage you promised you’d pay for) to talking in front of established women and men in various industries.

The few days before the event are pretty much a blur, it took a lot of preparation, we wanted to go big, everything down to the napkins, choice of goodies and quotes to place around the venue were discussed at length, it had to be perfection and for us, we think it was pretty close.

The Event

We got to the room early to set everything up and although we tried every single option, the projector didn’t work on the screen which ended up wasting important getting ready time, so for anyone who was sitting from the middle to back (we apologise (legitimately) about the poor site line). The snacks were set up on the table to look as Instagrammable as possible, along with the balloons and posters. We got ready in a record time of 15 minutes and after that, the girl power playlist was pumping and the drinks were flowing, giving a chance for everyone to arrive and network with one another before we got down to the real event, the speakers.

Our very own Managing Director, Chris opened the event with a very honest introduction outlining exactly why we wanted GirlCode to take place and why it was important to have events like this and he continued to host the evening, introducing our speakers and the Q&As.

Megan, our Digital Account Executive and Co-Founder of GirlCode set the scene for the night, by sharing a personal perspective of why she believed in GirlCode and why it was important to her as well as highlighting movements and statistics which showed that there was still work to be done when it came to equality in the workplace.

Rosie, our Digital Marketing Manager talked about how we should Stop Saying Sorry. She stated that there have been many occasions where she has felt under pressure to apologise for not being technical but in reality, as with many people you don’t actually realise your skills and abilities until you break them down one by one. Rosie also discussed the relationship between the developer and the marketer and how there is often an attempt to outsmart one another when really these relationships should be built on teaching one another in order to make the client delivery better.

Bethan, or BethanInBrum quickly became one of our favourite Birmingham Bloggers with her realistic and honest representation of what it’s like to be a blogger with a full-time job and how you should remain true to who you are, no matter if this results in fewer followers. She spoke about how her blog changed from being revolved around her life in Liverpool (as a student) where she would blog about her love life to her followers and when she realised that actually, she wanted to write more of a lifestyle blog she did it but not necessarily everyone in the mainstream blog scene will do this. She reminded us of the importance of being who we are and doing what we love.

Tara, the managing director of East Village told us why we shouldn’t surrender to the personality police. Being in digital there are stereotypes that are associated with certain job roles, for instance, working in PR you would expect them to be bubbly, outgoing and basically never be at their desks. A website developer is very much associated with being quiet and a ‘nerd’ that talks about nothing else but PHP and app development. This is often not the case though, everyone is different, everyone has a different personality and Tara reminded us of how our personality’s shouldn’t stop us from going for job roles and entering industries that we want to.

Now I could talk all day about exactly what we did, the stress, the reward, the talks but I’ll stop now.

But quickly, one more point. We are hosting another GirlCode event in May (dates to be released soon) which will surround Mental Health and Wellbeing. We welcome any suggestions just let us know if you want to get involved!

Email us at: hello@wearegirlcode.com or megan@apex-ecommerce.co.uk

Interested in how we can help you make the most of your online store? Digital Cake are Shopify experts, as an agency, we know what will help you be better online.

Introducing Girl Code, A Digital Community

2018 marks a lot of changes and milestones for women all over the world, with new laws coming into play and in the UK, 2018 marked 100 years since women got the vote. It made sense to start the Girl Code event this year and it made even more sense to launch it on the 8th March, International Women’s Day.

So, what exactly is Girl Code?

Well, there is no doubt that the digital industry is growing rapidly and the number of people joining the industry and aspiring to join the industry is increasing constantly. But what is the role of women within it?

This event is about creating a space for women to talk about their own experiences and struggles and more importantly how they have overcome these battles to succeed and achieve their desired goals.

Please join us for an evening of inspiring and truthful talks from women within different sectors of the digital industry.

There has been a reported loss of revenue and profits for Zara within the US and the UK in the last year, despite an increase in sales. Thankfully, this hasn’t stopped Zara from investing heavily into their UK branches, and more importantly, technology.

An article from Inditex hinted that a temporary pop-up store in Westfield Stratford would be opened last Friday but this pop-up store would be one like no other. One of Zara’s flagship stores is undergoing a massive transformation and is set for reopening in May with some pretty innovative and revealing changes within the retail and digital world.

With an integration of the offline and online in the retail industry, we could not only see a change in the way offline stores operate but also see alterations made in online user journeys and social media marketing.

The Pop-Up Store

The temporary pop up store has been designed for consumers to order and collect online purchases that have been made, as well as a click and collect service. This is a stern move towards the integration of the online and offline and Zara have spared no expense.

The argument against online shopping is that consumers still like to be able to see and experience the product. Consumers also love to try garments on, because in reality it never looks the same as it does on the model. The advancements in technology within the pop-up store (which will no doubt also be incorporated into the new flagship store in Westfield Stratford), have enabled this functionality with the creation of a mirror embedded product recommendation system. This system not only knows your size without you having to input it but also recommends other garments and accessories which compliment the garment you are interested in. This is an exciting step forward for retailers, buyers, and ecommerce. The detailed personalisation of this technology can only increase that all important conversion rate.

The Refurbished Flagship Store

This week marked the start of the much-anticipated refurbishment of Zara’s flagship store in Westfield Stratford. It has been planned that the new store will have four main sections; womenswear, menswear, kidswear and a section dedicated to online orders. This change comes from Zara’s ever-growing commitment to creating the perfect omni-channel experience.

The collection point will be formed of two small warehouses that allow for online orders to be collected in store by consumers whenever it suits them. Now, I know your thinking ‘Loads of retailers are providing click and collect services, what is so special about this one?’ Well, first of all no more waiting around in ques to collect your package. The system has been created so that it can scan a QR code as well as PIN codes that have been generated on ordering, so in just a few seconds your order is processed and placed in a mailbox within the store to be collected.

What else? You can now pay via the Zara and Inditex App, InWallet or even through a self checkout making paying in-store even easier, for those in a hurry. Not only is Zara committed to creating a more wholesome and consistent experience for shoppers, they are also dedicated to their own eco-efficient store programme which will lead to systems placed in the new store that aims at reducing energy and emissions as well as encouraging paperless receipts.

The Impact On Ecommerce

Evidently the impact is hard to predict as this pop-up store and the plans for the new Zara are the first of its kind, however, we can try. This innovation suggests a massive move towards Zara building an omni-channel experience, which people have been crying out for. The concept is based around the idea that no matter how a consumer has decided to buy, whether it is in store, on a mobile or through an app, their experience should always provide the same value. This hasn’t necessarily been the case, for instance with some retail stores they have products that are for online consumers only and similarly in the store, sales online and sales in-store do not always match.

If these advances made by Zara are successful then it could lead to a whole new way of shopping. Moving towards a merge of experiences between the offline and the online and will lead the way in other companies moving heavily towards the need for digital services.

Conclusion

It is early days yet and Zara will have a long way to go before they can start to fine tune the experience to reflect what the consumer actually wants. Nevertheless, they have shown initiative as well as the ability to adapt, by being the first big retail chain to make this kind of move. This move has put them ahead of their competitors in terms of innovation and trend setting. Zara have also demonstrated that there is a massive need for retailers that operate both in store and online to constantly refine and revolutionise the user experience in order to create more conversions.

Apex’s big prediction? Zara will heavily rely on a big push of social media marketing and PR from now on, with interactive videos planning to make a big wave this year they could really benefit from demonstrating their new technology to their big following.

So you’ve took the leap and decided to start up your business online, but where do you start?

In reality, your start-up will either succeed or fail there is no in between.

Here are the top questions you need to answer in order to start your successful ecommerce business.

What Does Your Brand Say About You?

It cannot be emphasised enough how important your brand is. Serving customers online is different to serving customers in a physical store, they don’t get to see your personality and excellent customer service skills.

Are You Being Competitive?

The downfall of having an online business is that you are competing with more companies who operate all over the world and some of these competitors will be bigger and more established than yourselves. While consumers will be happy to pay for a high-quality product that is unique, this willingness will only go so far when spoilt for choice.

To compete with bigger and smaller brands you need to stay on top of your service proposition. By being competitive on delivery charges, the option to deliver goods worldwide and speed of delivery, you increase your chances of getting a piece of the action.

If they can get an equally as good product at half the price, then why would they choose you?

Earning the sale is one thing, but the journey does not stop there. Often underutilised by ecommerce businesses, the packaging of your products is crucial in earning returning customers and new one’s trust. The packaging of your products is a very close touchpoint with your consumers. Unlike purchasing in a store, consumers never actually get to meet you so your packaging allows you to say something about your brand.

Last year, Shopify wrote a guide on how to design the unboxing experience for those all-important ‘Instagrammable’ moments.

A package delivery that makes your customer feel special on opening, is a gift that will just keep giving.

Social

It is inevitable you will have to be social, social media is a sure way to find new customers as well as keeping current customers engaged. Social media platforms have become a trust mark, if you’re not on social then are you really a legit company?

You will need to find a tone of voice that best represents your company and keep it consistent across all of your social media platforms as well as on your website. High quality photographs and videos of your products and behind the scenes will all be of interest to prospective customers.

Let’s say, you want to get customers to include you in their address book. Chances are they’ll think about saving your contact details, but they won’t actually do it. In this scenario, the vCard Code or the “virtual business card” code provides a perfect solution. All customers need to do is scan the QR code using their smartphone and your contact details are immediately saved.

Let’s have another example.

Say, you have an app that you want customers to download. Similar to the previous example, all customers need to do is scan the QR code in the product. Once they scan the code, they’re immediately forwarded to its location in the app store.

Yes, it’s that fast and easy!

But they’re not limited to contact details and app URLs. A simple QR code can store PDF files, images, MP3 music, web addresses and a lot more. This makes them an ideal tool for marketers with a lot of creative ideas and promotions.

In fact, QR code creation boosted a whopping 1,253% in 2011 and two million QR codes were created in less than three months! A similar report by Scanbury found that that QR codes led to 4.3 scans per person in 2015. This data isn’t surprising given that there are an estimated 10 billion mobile devices used worldwide.

How Can You Use QR Codes in Your Next Marketing Campaign?

Early adopters of QR codes have found a lot of creative ways to integrate them into their marketing campaigns. Here are some beautiful QR code ads by Instagram and Angry birds:

Once users scan the images, they are immediately redirected to the app store.

Meanwhile, retail stores like Tesco helped commuters maximise their time in the bus by embedding QR codes in subway stations and bus stops. Customers who scan the code can shop their groceries online while waiting for the train. When they get home, the items they shopped can be delivered right on their doorstep, which is a great time saver.

Spotify made a similar move when it introduced Spotify codes, which allowed users to immediately share their favorite artists, albums, and playlists via QR codes. They can scan a friend’s QR code to follow their playlists, or share a screenshot of a QR code to share their Spotify profile.

Ready to Include QR Codes In Your Next Marketing Campaign?

Creating QR codes is fast and easy. Just head over to QR Stuff to create your first QR code (for free)! If you prefer to have beautiful and eye-catching codes, then you can head over to Custom QR Codes to design the codes you want.

On Thursday 11th January, Facebooks creator, Mark Zuckerburg, announced that big changes were coming to the Facebook news feed as we know it.

Changes in the form of a new algorithm update, deep breath. The aim of the update is to take Facebook right back to the platforms original intent, a place to share updates with friends and family. The news has set brands into a frenzied state of panic, questioning what this means for their reliable referral traffic.

When announcements like these hit the news, it’s difficult, especially as a marketer, to not instantly plan how we shall fight through this – ensuring we come out on top. May I add, just because something got harder, that does not mean it’s no longer worth your time.

From the surface, the change appears to be a push towards a happier 2018, however, call me pessimistic but this feels like a sure way to get Facebook back on our minds, following recent reports of drops in user activity.

We can all attempt to make sense of Mark Zuckerberg’s surgically constructed announcement but I can’t help but feel his hands are in fact tied. No institution of this size, home to over 2 billion active users, can just remove themselves from being an integral part of the global news ecosystem. Sadly, much like many of the changes we are facing moving in 2018, this update is born out of ‘the Trump effect.’ Facebook has been exposed to a bombardment of bad press since Trump was elected, criticised heavily for the hosting of ‘fake news’.

The platform was never created to be a space for publishers and brands, this is something Facebook grew into from increasing consumer demand. The move was encouraged by Facebook and journalistic style news and brands have significantly benefitted from this movement.

Do I believe this is the end of Facebook’s relationship with promotional content, no.

Google and Facebook, The Ultimate ‘Frenemies’

Facebook is a business, although this decision may seem brash, the decision will be bottom line focused. Personally, I feel Facebook has let slip what should have been better controlled some time ago. Spammy content has been given the same importance as the really good stuff. This has created a very noisy environment, stripping this back to a space where users are supposedly ‘happier’ and brands and news are pushed to promote better content, can only be good for the industry, no?

Pounds will continue to feed into social media, that really goes without saying. Please be aware that Facebook has not yet directly referenced a drop in Paid Advertisement on the platform.

So play by the rules, know your audience and create compelling content with a budget and nothing much has really changed.

Removing all movement on Facebook for publishers and brands forever would be to push them closer to their biggest frenemy, Google. An organisation which is working tirelessly to better its relationship with news.

The advertising spend will be spent somewhere, I highly doubt Facebook will allow their loss to be Googles gain.

In 2018, its certain that content is going to be the main focus for anyone creating a marketing campaign. But the important questions remain in place: What should be your content marketing strategy? How do you get subscribers to respond to the content that you create? How do you create content that caters to the needs of your target audience?

The answer lies in smart content.

In HubSpot’s words, smart content refers to “content that is intelligently personalised to your customer’s needs.”

Using smart content, you can deliver content based on where customers are in the buying cycle, or different content to regular visitors. Smart content also lets you deliver personalised experiences to customers based on their country, device type, referral source, preferred language and a lot more!

Let’s take a look at an example…

You want to deliver different web experiences to first-time site visitors and regular customers. For first-time customers, you want them to subscribe to your newsletter, so a pop-up appears a minute after they’ve browsed through the page. As for the regular customers, you want to encourage them to subscribe, so you send them an email that directs them to a landing page—where they can download a free Ebook, in exchange for a subscription.

This is how smart content works in a nutshell.

Its about creating dynamic content and delivering the content based on the customer’s interest or stage in the buying cycle.

Below is an example of smart content in action—from Hubspot. On the left side, you’ll find the image of what first time visitors see when they visit a landing page. In contrast, the right side illustrates the same message, but instead of “Say Hello to the New Hubspot,” it says, “Hi Jane, Welcome back!”

The result?

In a 12 month study that involved analysing 93,000 CTAs (calls-to-action), Hubspot found that personalised content, performed 42% better. The study also found that 61% of customers preferred companies that were inclined to create customised and individualised content, and 88% of content marketing professionals planned to include personalised elements in their campaigns.

Such results are enough to get brands onboard with smart content. You’ve probably seen several examples of it for the past year.

More and more email marketing campaigns sent personalised trigger-based emails. In fact, eConsultancy found that 74% of marketers believed that targeted personalisation of emails increased customer engagement.

Several marketing experts have also talked about the famous account-based marketing strategy, where marketing teams nurture leads by sending personalised emails to B2B professionals—with links to content that seem relevant to their business. Others have created content marketing strategies that are focused on delivering content based on the segment that the consumer belongs in.

In 2018, smart content is bound to be one of the most widespread and most powerful marketing strategies. The more personalised a brand’s approach—the more likely it is that its execution will lead to more conversions.

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